A. OPINIONS OF PROMINENT AMERICANS ON THE EMPLOYMENT OF INDIANS IN WAR.
It is not easy to determine the position of prominent individuals on this question prior to the date when Congress had come to a conclusion. The passage of the Quebec Bill in 1774, and the ample powers which were conferred upon Carleton to suppress revolt, had occasioned alarm. Perhaps the circumstances justified suspicion, but there was no special cause for it. The language used in Carleton's commission was copied from the commission of James Murray. If there had been no change of governors, the powers conferred upon the governor could never have been supposed to have been specially directed against the rebellious colonies.[1414] After the outbreak of hostilities, we meet, in the published correspondence of the day, with occasional expressions of opinion on the question of employing Indians. It must not be forgotten that when these letters were written rumors were current that the English in Canada were endeavoring to secure the services of Indians, and to the extent that the writers believed these statements their opinions were doubtless influenced by them. On May 14th, Joseph Warren wrote to Samuel Adams, saying: "It has been suggested to me that an application from your Congress to the Six Nations, accompanied with some presents, might have a very good effect. It appears to me to be worthy of your attention, etc." (Frothingham's Warren). On August 4th, Washington communicated to the President of Congress the opinion of a Caughnawaga chief, that if an expedition against Canada was meditated the Indians in that quarter would give all their assistance. On Sept. 21st, he reported to the honorable Congress that, "encouraged by the repeated declarations of Canadians and Indians, and urged by their requests", he had dispatched the Arnold expedition (Sparks's Washington and his Corresp. of the Rev.). On August 27th, Schuyler wrote to Washington that he was informed that "Carleton and his agents are exerting themselves to procure the savages against us." While he did not believe that Carleton would be successful except in procuring some of the remote Indians to act as scouts, he nevertheless added, "I should, therefore, not hesitate a moment to employ any Indians that might be willing to join us" (Lossing's Schuyler). Judge Drayton, of South Carolina, on September 25th addressed the Cherokee warriors at Congaree in the following words: "So should we act to each other like brothers; so shall we be able to support and assist each other against our common enemies; so shall we be able to stand together in perfect safety against the evil men who in the end mean to ruin you, as well as ourselves, who are their own flesh and blood." In January, 1776, Washington felt that the important moment had arrived when the Indians must take a side. He knew that if the Indians concerning whom he wrote did not desire to be idle, they would be "for or against us." "I am sensible", he added, "that no artifices will be left unessayed to engage them against us." On April 19th he wrote to the President of Congress: "In my opinion it will be impossible to keep them in a state of neutrality; they must, and no doubt soon will, take an active part either for or against us. I submit to Congress whether it would not be better immediately to engage them on our side." On July 13th he reported to the President of Congress that, without authority from Congress, he had directed Gen. Schuyler to engage the Six Nations in our interest on the best terms he and his colleagues could procure. "I trust", he added, "the urgency of the occasion will justify my proceeding to Congress." On the day of the Declaration of Independence he again wrote to Congress, submitting the propriety of engaging the Eastern Indians. Notwithstanding the various arguments against employing them, John Adams thought "we need not be so delicate as to refuse the assistance of Indians, provided we cannot keep them neutral." In June, the Rev. Samuel Kirkland said that the Indians were generally of opinion that it was impracticable for them to continue longer in a state of neutrality. Gen. Schuyler, notwithstanding his early expressions of readiness to "employ any Indians that might be willing to join us", seemed reluctant, when the time came, to avail himself of their services. He preferred to get decently rid of the offer of the Caughnawagas rather than to employ them. As to the Six Nations, he evidently felt that the utmost to be hoped for was to hold a portion of them quiet through the influence of such men as Kirkland and Deane.[1415] Schuyler's labors as Indian commissioner had been in the direction of neutrality; and even after direct instructions from Congress to engage the Six Nations on the best terms that could be procured, he wrote in reply, with evident satisfaction, when the news of the disaster to our forces in Canada was spread among the Indians, that "our conduct in demanding a neutrality in all former treaties has been greatly applauded in all their councils." The Life of Jonathan Trumbull, Sen., Governor of Connecticut, by I. W. Stuart (Boston, 1859), gives particulars concerning the contact of this active participant in affairs with some of these questions of policy. Trumbull, as well as the Massachusetts committeemen, was in correspondence with Major Brown in Canada, and through him as well as through them information was conveyed to the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts Bay of rumors of a projected attempt to recapture Ticonderoga and Crown Point with a force of regulars and Indians.
B. EVENTS AT THE NORTH, NOT CONNECTED WITH THE SIX NATIONS.
Among the Western tribes, the Delawares were divided, but the majority of the Indians were unfriendly, and completely under the influence of the English commander at Detroit. At the East the attitude of the Indians was not so pronounced, and they were slow to move. On June 20, 1776, Washington wrote to Schuyler that he was "hopeful the bounty Congress had agreed to allow and would prove a powerful inducement to engage the Indians in our service." From Schuyler he learned that "our emissaries among the Indians all agree that it would be extremely imprudent to take an active part with us, as they think it would effectually militate the contrary way." The reference in Washington's letter to bounties applies to the resolution of Congress to offer bounties, which had passed three days before the letter was written. With the same prompt attention he wrote to the General Court of Massachusetts, transmitting the resolve of Congress authorizing the employment of the Eastern Indians, exactly three days after its passage; at the same time he solicited the aid of that body in carrying it into execution. He designated five or six hundred as the number which he wished to have engaged. On the same day he wrote to the Continental Congress that he had communicated with the General Court of Massachusetts Bay, "entreating their exertions to have the Eastern Indians forthwith engaged and marched to join this army." It appears from the correspondence and from the proceedings at the conferences that he had already written a letter to these Indians, and it chanced that his letter to the Provincial Congress reached Watertown at about the same time that a delegation from the Eastern Indians reported there in consequence of his letter to them. When the Indians were called upon to state by what authority they spoke, they produced the letter from Washington, leaving it to be inferred that they were accredited upon their mission in consequence of the letter having been received. At the conference which was held with them they were full of high-sounding phrases of friendship. "We shall have nothing to do with Old England", they said, "and all that we shall worship, or obey, will be Jesus Christ and George Washington." The report of the conference states that "a silver gorget and heart, with the king's arms and bust engraved on them, were delivered to the interpreter to be returned to the Indians. He presented them to their speaker, but with great vehemence and displeasure he refused to take them, saying they had nothing to do with King George and England; whereupon the President told them they should have a new gorget and heart, with the bust of Gen. Washington and proper devices to represent the United Colonies." A treaty was exchanged with these Indians on July 17, 1776, whereby they agreed to furnish six hundred Indians to a regiment which was to be officered by the whites, and have in addition to the Indians two hundred and fifty white soldiers. As a result of all this, the Massachusetts Council subsequently reported that seven Penobscot Indians, all that could be procured, were enlisted in October for one year; and in November, Major Shaw reported with a few Indians who had enlisted in the Continental service. The Council of Massachusetts Bay expressed their regrets to Gen. Washington that the major had met with no better success. Washington's letter to the Eastern nations appears to have contained advice to them to keep the peace if they concluded it was to their advantage. These nations afterwards protested that the young men who in the character of chiefs made the treaty of war acted without authority, and they therefore returned the treaty. This practically ended efforts to secure alliance with Eastern Indians. There was further correspondence between Congress and Washington concerning the Stockbridge Indians, in which Congress first announced that the enlistment of these Indians must stop, and then at Washington's request permitted it to be renewed. Finally Congress was content to instruct the government agent to engage the friendship of the Eastern Indians, "and prevent their taking part in the unjust and cruel war against these United States."
C. EVENTS AT THE SOUTH.
The first result of the struggle between Great Britain and the colonies for the friendship of the Indians was felt in the North at St. John's and the Cedars. The first aggressive movement within the limits of the colonies took place in the South. The correspondence of Sir James Wright traces the progress of events in that department. The "Liberty People", as he says, asserted in June, 1775, that Stuart was endeavoring to raise the Cherokees against them, and "all that Stuart could say would not convince them to the contrary." In July Sir James heard that the Provincial Congress had agreed to send 2,000 pounds of gunpowder into the Indian country as a present from the people, "not from the king, or from the government, or from the superintendent, or from the traders, but from the people of the province."
Note.—Portion of the map in Drayton's Mem. of the Amer. Rev., ii. 343. Key: Double dotted line shows the march of the army; the single dotted line shows the march of detachments; the + indicates battlegrounds.